


i'm in love with a ghost

by ariadnes



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Accidental Plot, Alternate Season/Series 02, Angst with a Happy Ending, Archivist Jonathan Sims, Blood and Gore, Canon-Typical Spiral Nonsense, Emotional Constipation, Hanahaki Disease, Jon is First Oblivious and Then Really Sad, M/M, Monster Flirting, Monsters in Love (Eventually)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-25
Updated: 2020-05-07
Packaged: 2021-03-01 01:41:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 20,791
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23306986
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ariadnes/pseuds/ariadnes
Summary: The first time Jon coughed up a flower bud he assumed it was a poorly executed assassination attempt.It wasn't.
Relationships: Jonathan Sims & Tim Stoker, Michael/Jonathan Sims
Comments: 70
Kudos: 194





	1. going off script

It started on an unassuming day with an unassuming act that Jon would never, really, be able to pinpoint. 

He had, in a show of great restraint and subtleness, taken his lunch break fifteen minutes after Sasha. There was something about her excuse of having a new boyfriend that rubbed him the wrong way. Perhaps he was being overly cautious, but, well—apparently he worked at a wax museum which _was_ strange. Under ordinary circumstances, Sasha having lunches at a wax museum with a mysterious boyfriend she never spoke of would have just seemed oddly private. 

There was nothing ordinary about the circumstances they'd all found themselves in, though. Jon knew that. He knew it like he knew the sky was grey and that Gertrude was murdered by someone she worked with—someone that he now worked with. 

That was how he found himself outside Madame Toussard's Wax Museum, hiding in the bushes across the street. 

Par for the course, absolutely nothing strange happened while he crouched awkwardly in hiding. After half an hour he saw Sasha leave. She looked unruffled. Somehow that did nothing to ease the pit in his stomach. Still, there'd probably be nothing left to gain from watching the museum and he resolved himself to wait for ten more minutes before leaving his hiding place and returning to work. 

His plan went smoothly, bar one small hold up when he knicked the palm of his hand on the thorny stem of a flower he hadn't noticed lurking among the foliage. The cut bled very little and, by the time he was back in his office pouring over statements he'd forgotten about it entirely. 

And so it began. 

Jon was walking back towards his apartment, Chinese takeaway swinging in a bag by his side, when he felt it. The distinct, unsettling feeling of being watched—observed from somewhere he had no hope of ever knowing—stalked by something he never wanted to meet. His footsteps stuttered to a halt and he looked around, peering down the face of the alley he'd stopped beside, and found no one watching him. No one passing him on the street even seemed to glance in his direction. 

The feeling prevailed, though. 

Not for the first time, Jon wondered if everything really was happening in his head—perhaps his paranoia was unfounded. Maybe Elias was right and he needed to take some time off to recalibrate and _"overcome his trauma."_ Whatever that meant. 

He took a centering breath.

Then he started on his way again, only to have a hand—huge, with long, bony fingers—wrap around his arm and drag him into the alleyway. He let out a choked, distressed sound, his heart rabbiting in his chest, the back of his neck prickling with a familiar feeling of _danger-danger-danger,_ and came face to face with Michael, grinning at him with a Cheshire smile—completed with more teeth than a normal person would have.

Though Michael wasn't really a person, was it? 

At least, not anymore, if it ever was not—unmade? Distorted? An interesting question, but one he'd likely never get an answer to given his presumed imminent death. 

"Hello, Archivist," Michael said in its giddy, giggly voice. "You should keep better watch of yourself." 

Jon swallowed, his arm undoubtedly bruising under the tight grip Michael kept on him. "Hello, Michael. What—uh—what do you want—?" His question was cut off with a hiss of pain as the sharp fingers that held him dug warningly into his skin, stinging harshly where they sliced. 

"Naughty, naughty Archivist. I'm afraid now is not the time for your pesky questions." 

"I don't understand," Jon said tightly, unsure how else he would get answers. 

Michael laughed, a headache-inducing sound that rattled around in his head. "I know. Isn't it delightful?"

He didn't answer. He just stood as still as he could, feeling very much like a gazelle trapped in the gaze of a lion—if a lion was interested in tormenting its prey, watching them with its sickly, yellow eyes and shifting cherubic face. 

Michael sighed in tacky faux-disappointment, the smile on its stretching even wider as it ducked its head down lower to fill Jon's personal space. "You're going to get yourself killed, Archivist. I don't know why I help you."

"Help me?" Jon repeated in dull shock. 

"Oh," Michael giggled, pleased as punch, "If you insist. Just remember that you asked me to." 

"What _—_ _no—_ wait just a moment—!" Jon, in a sudden frenzy, attempted to jerk his arm out of Michael's hold, desperate to be away from the thing that was tormenting him. He had a rising, dreadful feeling that whatever "help" Michael would give him would lead him into a dizzying, endless system of corridors and doorways. A familiar feeling of grief for Helen Richardson clogged his mind.

Michael didn't budge, though it did seem to watch Jon with a horrible amusement. "Now, there's no need for those _dramatics,_ Archivist. I'm not going to do anything to you. I'm simply... going to advise you. You want to know who killed the last Archivist, don't you?" 

That caught his attention. "You know—?" 

"No questions," it warned him. "They are so close to you, Archivist. But you still refuse to open your _eyes._ Only then will you see them." 

"My eyes are open," Jon said, frantic. "I've been _looking,_ I just—"

Michael, finally, released his arm, retreating backward, its smile still fixed in place. "I've already given you more than I should have, but you _are_ interesting, Archivist. I'll be checking in." 

"No, wait!" Jon cried out, jolting forward, but it was too late. Michael was already crossing the threshold of a door that came and went to nowhere, slipping out of existence as if it had never even been there. 

And Jon was left in the alleyway with half-cold Chinese food, blood staining the previously white sleeve of his shirt, and a cigarette craving. He could have cried. 

"—now I cannot even bear to tend my garden. I still remember what it feels like to be packed into the earth, rot surrounding me, and I don't think I'll ever forget it. Statement ends," Jon sighed, feeling inexplicably drained despite the early hour of the morning. "Miss Thompson was never followed up with, and denied our recent attempts at outreach, stating that she's worked hard to put the events she shared behind her. Even so, there's something—"

He stopped abruptly, freezing in his seat as he felt something reach out and touch his shoulder. 

That should have been an impossibility, considering he was _alone_ in his office, and yet. 

Hesitantly, he called out, "Hello?" 

Whatever was touching his shoulder, pulled away, and he heard shuffling from behind him, until a familiar, towering figure crossed into his peripherals, moving to lean against his desk. "Such politeness. How refreshing, Archivist." 

"Michael," Jon said, mouth suddenly dry. "It's been a while." 

Nearly two weeks since it had accosted Jon in the alleyway. He'd been counting. Awaiting it and its "check-in." 

"Maybe. I'm not so good at time. It muddles so easily. Comes and goes, stops and speeds, drags and catches. I'm not a fan." 

The headache he'd been ignoring pulsed unpleasantly. He wasn't sure what to say. "Right. That sounds—bad."

"Does it?" Michael asked, tilting its head in such a way that its mess of curls tumbled all to one side. "There's no need to lie, Archivist. There's no shame in not knowing." Something sharp had entered its voice, mocking and painful, grating down Jon's very skin. "I came to give you a hint." 

"About Gertrude's death?" Jon asked, leaning forward in intrigue. 

Michael giggled but did not answer. Instead, all it said was, "Check case number 0020810. It should be on the third floor of files, hidden behind research on sleep paralysis." 

Jon blinked dumbly in shock. "You hid it there?" 

"I remember it being there," Michael said, its voice softer than Jon had ever heard it. 

"How—you worked here?" 

Whatever melancholy had briefly caught Michael left as quickly as it had come. It laughed like shattered glass. "What is a _you?_ Certainly not a _me._ Come, Archivist, you know I am not a me or a them or a him or a her. I am a _what."_

"But you weren't always a what, were you? Once you were a who and you worked here, didn't you?"

Michael reached a hand out, its long fingers stretching impossibly far across the space between them, tapping onto the delicate skin beside Jon's eye. Its hands never appeared normal, but besides the spindliness and sharpness, Jon hadn't noticed just how inhuman they could appear. It didn't break his skin, but the warning was there, nonetheless. "What did I say about asking questions, Archivist?"

"Not to," Jon answered, hardly trusting himself to breathe. 

"And you do anyways," Michael said, before giggling, tapping its fingers against Jon's skin once more before pulling away. "I wonder if you'll be so quick to accept your nature the uglier it becomes. Enjoy the statement, Archivist." 

The statement did not shed any more light on the character of Gertrude Robinson or her murder but did manage to unsettle Jon immensely.

He'd found the file exactly where Michael said it would be, coated by a thick layer of dust that spoke to it being hidden back there for years. It was curious to think that before Michael had become whatever it was that it had worked for the Archives.

It also raised the question of how something that was once, presumably, a man became so thoroughly a monster. 

Such questions were neither here nor there, however, so Jon firmly pushed them out of his mind. He had greater worries than the state of Michael's inhumanity, anyways. 

Namely, the contents of case number 0020810.

It offered the account of Jacob Dodds regarding a table his father had bought and the subsequent breakdown of his younger sister. Dodds described the table his father had brought home as large, with an odd hypnotic pattern on it. Soon after it entered their possession, his younger sister, Jenny, began to have a supposedly schizophrenic breakdown, during which she claimed that their father was replaced by a stranger. Jenny Dodds was committed to a mental health facility quite early on in her breakdown and she died in that very facility three months after her admittance under somewhat suspicious circumstances. 

Jacob Dodds would have just considered the whole thing a family tragedy if not for the fact that when going through Jenny's possessions he found a box of old polaroids which showed, among other evidence, a family picture where there was, in the place of his father, a man he'd never seen before. 

Gertrude's attempt at follow-up only revealed that Jacob Dodds died in a car crash a week after giving his statement and his father, Terrance Dodds, was never heard from again. It was all very unpleasant to listen to, as most statements were, but it wasn't until Gertrude's final remark that Jon felt the faint, horrific sense of understanding that he assumed Michael was trying to impart on him. 

Through the grainy tape-recording, he heard Gertrude say, "The table is, undoubtedly, the same one that Adelard Dekker supposedly sealed the Stranger's puppet in, or, as Adelard called it, the NotThem. It is unfortunate that the table seems to be in circulation, with its whereabouts currently unknown, especially since its power seems to still steal people, despite what Adelard promised me."

Jon was deficient in many regards—and he was sure Tim would be pleased to list them all out for him if he so desired—but he was great at connecting dots and solving puzzles. There was a reason he joined the Magnus Institute, beyond that of the horror-story lurking in his past. 

A table with a hypnotic pattern and people who suddenly became _other_ once interacting with it. It sounded familiar. Horrifically so. 

And, if his hunch was right, then someone around him, someone at the Institute, had been taken and switched with the NotThem that Gertrude mentioned. And, even worse, there would be no way for him to know, because, as it seemed, only a few people were able to notice when someone was switched and he clearly wasn't one of them. 

But Michael was. And Michael had helped him. 

Immeasurably so. 

This—the presence of some parasitic interloper who stole the face of someone around him—was even more pressing than his investigation of the tunnels or of Gertrude's death. And without Michael's intrusion, Jon would have likely never known. 

Why tell him? Why _help_ him? 

It was almost kind. 

The very thought of labeling Michael, who helped and tormented him in equal measure, kind was absurd, but, somehow, Michael had become one of the only people he knew he could trust to help him with this. Perhaps, in part, because he knew how much he could not trust it. 

Jon laughed, only slightly hysterically, before he felt something tickle the back of his throat. He coughed—

And coughed and coughed, and was completely nonplussed to feel something that was _not_ phlegm come out of his mouth and fall into his palm. 

Sitting in his hand, wilted and streaked faintly with blood, was a white chrysanthemum. 

Coughing up a flower was not natural. 

Obviously. 

Jon's first thought was that someone—either Gertrude's killer or the NotThem—had grown tired of his investigation and decided to take care of him once and for all. Death by flower was strange but not stranger than anything else that he dealt with on a daily basis. Of course, as far as he knew, chrysanthemums weren't poisonous to humans and there were far more efficient ways to kill him than by somehow forcing a flower down his throat while he was unaware and hoping he choked.

No.

Whatever was going on was either a poor-mans assassination attempt, and therefore probably not whoever killed Gertrude or the NotThem, or there was something else going on. Something that led to him coughing up a flower.

Wonderful. 

In his typical fashion, however, Jon just wrapped the flower up in a tissue and shoved it in his garbage bin, resolving to do more research on any related cases of flower-coughing—and it was here that he realized just how ridiculous his life had become—that the Archives had. 

He would be fine. Hopefully. 

The Magnus Institute was, while not as large as other places of research, still quite well-staffed, with over a hundred people working every day. That meant there were over a hundred people who could have been Gertrude's killer or the NotThem—or, as improbable as it seemed, both. 

For some reason, however, Jon could not shake the feeling that both of the people he was looking for were close to him. Not only because of what Michael had told him _—do you even know that they're lying to you?—_ but also because something in him just _knew_ it. He knew there was a betrayal underfoot. He knew it was personal. 

But there was also the issue of what he did not know. He did not know why Gertrude was killed, though the more he learned about her the more he felt the reason was less cut-and-dry than he'd originally assumed, and he did not know if whoever killed Gertrude would want to kill him, as well. Which meant that his investigation of her death was less pressing than his discovery of the NotThem, which meant, in turn, that he might actually have to recalibrate and refocus. 

Someone around him wasn't themselves. 

Either Martin, who was always hovering around and always overly concerned, or Sasha, level-headed and kind and firm in her boundaries, or Elias, inscrutable and _apparently_ once-upon-a-time a pothead, or Tim, who—well, hated him and was unafraid to express it. 

Wait. 

If Jon was the NotThem and was trying not to rock the boat by revealing himself, he would not constantly criticize and insult his boss. He wouldn't be too bold. He wouldn't act in any way like Tim was acting. 

Maybe he wouldn't be as alone in his search for the truth as he thought. 

Though, that all depended on how much Tim hated him. 

Jon's plan, if it could be called that, went into effect Thursday before lunch. He'd made sure to act as he usually did—and it turned out his months of being ruthlessly paranoid came in handy when one found out someone was an imposter—and stopped by Tim's desk on his way to his office, letting him know he wanted to speak to him. In response, he received an eye-roll and a terse agreement. 

Later that day, Tim slouched into his office, his face already half-pressed into a glare as he sat in the chair opposite Jon's desk. "Time for the monthly interrogation, boss? Want to know if I kill babies or drink lambs blood or whatever else you're worried about?" 

Jon scowled. "No. I—well, I actually need your help." 

"My help," Tim repeated. "Why would I help you after the way you've been treating me and everybody else?"

"I'm sorry, Tim. For the... suspicion. And for the stalking. I didn't know who I could trust, but—well, but now I know I can trust you."

Tim laughed without much humor. "Finally realized that I didn't kill Gertrude, then?"

"Well. No, actually, I still haven't figured that much out yet—"

"Oh, for god's sake," Tim said, moving to stand up. 

Jon reached a hand out frantically. "Wait! Just—listen. Please. I'm still looking into Gertrude's murder, but something more pressing has come up. Someone in the office has been _replaced."_

Tim blinked at him. "Like... fired?"

"No, not fired," Jon said, groaning. "Look. Do you remember that table that was delivered here before the Prentiss incident? The one that matched up with Amy Patel's statement? It's in artifact storage right now. A big table with a hypnotic pattern. Do you remember?"

"Yes, I remember the table. It made you more neurotic than usual."

"Do you remember Amy Patel's statement? Her neighbor was replaced one day with someone she'd never seen before, but no one seemed to notice the difference."

"Yes, sure, I remember. But what does this have to do with anything?" Tim asked, his foot tapping impatiently. 

Jon let out a shaky breath. "Someone in the office has been _replaced,_ Tim." 

For a moment, Tim was silent, looking suitably concerned by the news. "How do you know?" 

He winced. "I—I was led to the conclusion by Michael."

"Michael," Tim said, slowly. "The Michael who met Sasha? Michael the monster, Michael? _That_ Michael?"

"Yes," Jon admitted. 

Tim scoffed. "Unbelievable!"

"Tim. _Tim,_ please, just listen to me—"

"You'll trust the word of a monster over that of people you've known for years! How do you know he's not lying to you?" 

Jon gestured hopelessly around. "I just _know._ Just like I know that Gertrude's killer is close by, just like I know the NotThem isn't you, just like I know Elias is going to schedule a staff meeting for tomorrow. I just _know."_

"How do you know that the—the _NotThem_ or whatever the hell you're calling it, isn't me?" Tim asked, severe in a way Jon hadn't been expecting. "Why do you trust me out of everyone else?" 

"You hate me. And you're not quiet about it, you don't hide it. You're bold and loud and not afraid of confrontation. If you were a thing who replaced someone else entirely, rewrote their existence, wouldn't you be quiet about it so no one would think to look twice at you?"

"I don't—I don't hate you," Tim said quietly. "I am angry at you. Furious, really. And I'll continue to be until you prove you're done being a complete dick. But..." 

Jon felt something like hope stir in his chest. It was depressingly unfamiliar. "But?"

Tim sighed heavily, looking as if he'd just signed his life away. "But I—god, I can't believe it—I believe you. I don't know _why._ You sound insane, Jon. Like beyond even your paranoia about one of us being a killer, but whatever it is that you feel—whatever it is that's catching your attention... I feel it too. That—ugh, god I even sound like you—that _offness."_

"You'll help me, then? With the investigation?"

"I have conditions," Tim said warningly, without much heat. "But, yes. I guess I will." 

Jon nodded, seriously. "What are your conditions?" 

"You need to keep me in the loop the entire time, no matter what you're doing. I want to know what's going on." 

"Yes—yes, of course. I'll even pull the tapes we have on the NotThem now if you want to catch up, and—"

Tim interrupted him. _"And_ I want you to treat Martin, Sasha, and I with respect. No more stalking us. No more yelling at us for little mistakes. No more looking at us strangely if we say something you think is odd."

"I don't—"

"It is basic human decency to treat your assistants with respect, Jon. There's a good chance that either Martin or Sasha or even both of them are still themselves _and_ innocent of murder, despite what you think, and they deserve to be treated better."

Jon winced. "I was going to say won't that look suspicious after I've spent the past few months treating you all—"

"Like shit?" Tim offered.

"I was going to say poorly, but yes, that fits, too," Jon said, sighing. "Won't it look strange to not be paranoid anymore?" 

"Easy. Take a trauma break like everyone else did months ago," Tim said, shrugging. "You can stay home for a few weeks to work over the problem, maybe actually see a therapist—I can't imagine that would hurt anything—and I'll come over a few times a week and we can come up with our plan. When your breaks over and you're sufficiently de-traumatized, come back and apologize to everyone and _voila,_ you're no longer a paranoid asshole. I'm sure Elias would be glad for you to take some time off, anyways. Hasn't he been harping you about it?" 

"That's actually not a bad idea," Jon said. Besides, if he took some time off he could finally look more in-depth into his flower problem, as his preliminary search hasn't garnered much of anything. "I'm sure HR would approve." 

Tim clapped his hands together. "It's decided then! You take a vacation and I'll stay and see if any of our coworkers are secretly monsters. An even trade." 

Jon didn't smile, but he did offer Tim a jerky, somewhat emotional nod. "I appreciate the help." And, then, when Tim was up and moving towards the door, he added, stiffly. "And I really am sorry, Tim."

Tim watched him for a long moment, before nodding in turn, his eyes sad. "Jon, we're going to figure this out. It'll be alright." 

Then he was gone. 

Jon leaned back in his chair, tension and relief both swirling through his head. It seemed he had to make a visit to HR. 

Somewhere in the room, unnoticed to Jon, a tape recorder clicked off. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this fic is incredibly tailored to my personal tastes so i really hope you enjoyed!
> 
> i have the next few chapters written and i'm going to try for updates every half-week or week, so i hope you stick along for the ride. this initially was supposed to be a one-shot but it kept growing and then the plot became too complicated and now its, kind of, a rewrite of season 2, but, uh, happier(ish) and with less trauma(ish).
> 
> please leave a review and if you ever want to chat about tma i'm on tumblr @jonathansharkers!


	2. a restful break

The reactions of everyone to the news of Jon's impromptu "trauma break" varied. 

When he'd stopped by Elias' office to let him know, in case HR delayed the paperwork getting forwarded which was known to happen, his boss had smiled warmly and nodded in all the right places while Jon talked. It was irksome. Elias, innocent or guilty, set Jon on edge. 

After he was finished giving his spiel, Elias only said, "I really think this will be for the best, Jon. You've been under so much stress lately, it's hard to see. Besides," he added with a sharp, off-putting look, "I would hate to have to find a new Archivist so soon." 

Jon quickly made his excuses after that. 

When he'd told his assistants, dropping into the breakroom, which he rarely did, the response was pretty much what he was expecting. 

Tim sighed and said, "It's about time they kick you out of here," before sending a half-way discreet wink his way. 

Sasha, a cup of untouched tea steaming in front of her, nodded seriously. "It's important to take a break every once in a while." 

Martin blinked at him in shock. "Will you be alright? I mean—I've never seen you take a vacation before, and it can be stressful being alone for long stretches of time. Is there anything I can do?" 

He brushed off Martin's concerns as best he could, before heading further into the Archives, collecting any file that, in his view, could be remotely applicable to any of the situations—Gertrude's death, the NotThem, and the flower coughing—for him to peruse while he was on his break. 

Somehow, he got the distinct impression that HR would not approve of his choice to bring work home with him. 

He was reading through a file—it was a story he was sure was almost certainly made-up about man-eating roses—when he heard it. The creak of a door being pushed open. 

Slowly, very slowly, he set the paper down, wrapped his throw tighter around himself, and waited on his sofa for Michael to appear. After all, who else would it be opening doors in his apartment when he knew very well that he was alone. 

Perhaps he should have been more frightened by a monster intruding so thoroughly into his life, but, for some reason, the fear didn't land. Not tonight, at least. Not while he sat waiting. 

He didn't wait for long. 

Michael looked as it always did. Close to human, but just off the mark. It was smiling when it saw Jon and it was smiling when it settled onto the lumpy armchair that sat across from him. It was strange seeing it like this—in his living room. Even sitting in his chair, Michael looked not-right. Its knees sat too high, its limbs were too twisting, its clasped hands were comically large. And yet, none of this frightened Jon like it should have. 

They sat in silence. 

It wasn't comfortable, not with Michael and its off-putting, teeth-aching presence, but it was quiet. 

Then Michael finally spoke, its voice nearly singing. "You haven't been in your den, Archivist. I've looked for you." 

"I'm on vacation. Three weeks of leave to compensate me for the trauma I've undergone," Jon explained, unsure why he even bothered. 

Michael laughed and the sound echoed unpleasantly, warbling in the air. "Three weeks? But Archivist, how will you eat? Do they wish to traumatize you more?" 

"I—I'm afraid I don't follow," Jon said, feeling prickles of unease begin to wash over him. 

"Of course you don't," Michael said, making no effort to explain. It tilted its head curiously to the side, blond curls bouncing across its face, as it gestured to the file he'd been reading. "Are you trying to supplement, instead?" 

Jon still didn't understand. "I'm trying to do more research into Gertrude and—and the NotThem."

Michael blinked at him, before its smile widened even further, teeth spilling out, sharp and continuous. "You figured it out," it said, sounding very pleased, "I was hoping you would. I thought you would."

"You know who it is." It wasn't a question. 

Michael giggled. "You don't, yet? Oh, Archivist, that's a shame."

"You won't tell me."

"Why would I tell you? It's much more fun for you to figure it out yourself. After all, isn't that your purpose, Archivist? Aren't you supposed to watch and record?" 

Jon's head hurt. Michael's voice was bruising. "I don't understand." 

Michael ignored him, focusing on the short stack of files Jon had left on the coffee table between them to read through that night. After two days of vacation, he only had about fifteen cases left to read through and no further leads. "Those won't tell you anything. They are all lying. All slipping and spinning and spiraling away from the truth. Clever deceit, but deceit always is." 

"What—"

"You should know that they're lying, Archivist," Michael continued, sounding chastising, "You know the real ones will be on tape. They always are." 

"Gertrude couldn't have possibly recorded all of the true statements. I'm still finding ones unrecorded from when she was Head Archivist. That implies to me that there are unrecorded true statements lurking about and the only way to find them is to read through all the fake ones." 

"The Archivist before you read what came to her. The ones that _felt_ right. You _know_ Archivist. You know these don't hold the answers you want." 

Jon licked his lips, "But you do." 

Michael laughed. "Do I? I am a door, Archivist. Not an answer. Not for you." 

"Why did you come here?" Jon asked, exhausted with the conversation. 

"It's as I said: you were not in your den. It's dangerous away from there."

Jon laughed, the sound brittle, and was gratified to see Michael twitch. "It's dangerous to be there. Hence the trauma break."

Again, Michael looked to the stack of files, before scooping them into its hands, its sharp fingers tearing through the pages. Jon could only watch, faintly displeased. "You're not taking a break, Archivist. Does your keeper know?"

"I don't have a _keeper,"_ Jon said, frostily.

Michael giggled. "How pleased he must be to hear that." It twisted in its seat. "You need a rest, Archivist. You never know if you'll have the choice to rest again." 

"I don't need to rest, I need answers," Jon snapped. 

That, somehow, seemed to set Michael off more. It giggled for an obscene amount of time, the sound scratching its way inside Jon's ears, all the way to his head where it rattled around, drowning out everything else. When it finally seemed to catch itself, it said, "Three weeks is a long time. Perhaps you'll starve. Perhaps you won't. But I like you, Archivist. I'll give you a chance. You may ask me one question. Anything at all. That should sate you for the time being." 

Jon wanted to say that there was no single question he could ask that would possibly sate him, but he had a feeling that what Michael was offering was entirely conditional on his mood. It would be best not to squander it. 

"Who..." he swallowed roughly, before continuing in a stronger voice, "Who killed Gertrude Robinson?" 

"My, what an interesting question," Michael said, tapping its fingers together. "Who killed the previous Archivist? Why, it was your keeper. The Eye of the Watcher. Protector, devil, liar," it let out a trilling laugh, "Friend and foe, to both you and me. That is who killed your predecessor." 

Jon could have screamed. "That doesn't answer my question." 

"What reason do I have to lie, Archivist?"

With a burst of energy that surprised him, Jon shot to his feet, moving towards Michael, but unsure of what he could possibly do. "I want you to answer the question without playing word games with me." 

"I don't think I will," Michael said, ambling leisurely on to its feet. "I think it's time for you to rest, Archivist." 

"No, you—" He never finished his sentence. 

Instead, he found himself blinking awake, back on the sofa, wrapped in his throw, sleep crusted over his eyes. There was sunlight streaming through his tiny window. He scrambled up, only to see the chair across from him empty. Michael was gone. Somehow he knew that it wasn't anywhere in the apartment, lurking around in the dark. No, it was gone for now, as was—

_Damnit._

All of the files he'd had strewn across the room were gone as well, both the ones he'd finished and the ones he hadn't started.

He cursed, searching for his phone. He found it wedged beneath the cushion he'd been using as a pillow and clicked it on to check the time with relief. It was only 8:29. He'd slept for a decent amount of time, around twelve hours give or take. Then he read the date. 

His hands shook. It had just been Saturday night. He was sure off it. Even if he slept for twelve hours, which wasn't normal for him, it should have been Sunday morning. 

It was Tuesday morning. 

Michael had put him to sleep for two days. Jon lowered himself back down onto the sofa, the panic shaking its way through him was offset only slightly by the fact that he actually felt well-rested. He couldn't remember the last time that had happened. 

The comfort of that was lukewarm at best and did nothing to stop him from shaking. 

That was, naturally, when he started coughing, again. 

This time falling into his hand were several poppy flowers, stemless, each a vibrant red, the color dulled by the flecks of his blood that stained them. 

Tim entered his apartment with the trepidation of a man who was expecting a tragedy. Jon watched him with impatient annoyance as he took in the state of things. None of Jon's coworkers had ever been invited to his apartment before this moment. In fact—now that he was thinking about it—no one had been over to his apartment except for Georgie, once over a year ago, and the bloke he'd been seeing briefly before his promotion at the Archives. 

"There's... a lot of natural light," Tim said, dropping down on to the sofa, his messenger bag swinging onto the ground. "I wasn't expecting that." 

"What were you expecting?" Jon asked before he could restrain himself. 

Tim tilted his head to the side, seeming to contemplate the question. "Something more cave-like. Cramped. Dirty. Stacks of old take-out."

"I _do_ have standards, you know." 

"Now that you mention it, I wasn't completely aware of that. I mean, really, boss, you look better after three days away from the office than you have in months." 

Jon glared, dropping onto the sofa beside Tim. "Thank you for the glowing review. Do you have what I _actually_ asked for?" 

"You should be kinder to me. I'm literally your only ally in your mad quest for the truth." 

He took a deep breath. "Tim, thank you very much for coming by on your off-hours and offering impromptu reviews of my lifestyle. I truly don't know what I would do without you."

"A bit like pulling teeth, isn't it?" 

"The cases, Tim." 

He sighed, long-suffering as if Jon was the one being difficult. "You know, I think HR has rules about bringing these things home with you. If I get fired it's on your head." 

"Yes, that and a million other things. Do you have them?" 

Tim yanked his bag up onto his lap, rummaging through it until he held in his hands a small stack of cassette tapes. "All recorded by Gertrude within the year before her death, just like you asked. Are you going to tell me why you wanted these or am I supposed to guess?"

Jon twitched, uneasily. "I'm trying to find out more about Michael." 

"Of course you are," Tim said, rolling his eyes. "How are these supposed to help with that?" 

"I think—well. I have a feeling that before Michael became... distorted that he worked for the Archives. Since I can't exactly ask Elias for the employee records I'm hoping to see if there's any mention of him on Gertrude's tapes." 

Tim frowned. "Why do you care so much about him? Shouldn't you be more concerned about the—NotThem?" 

Jon had been asking himself the same question. "I don't know. I just... I feel like I need to know. Without his help, I wouldn't have gotten this far. Besides, there's not much I can do about the NotThem from home. Have you noticed anything?" 

"Oh yeah," Tim said, "Earlier today, in the breakroom, Martin brewed an extra cup of tea—as he usually does—and started heading to your office before he remembered you were gone. It nearly brought tears to my eyes." 

"Be serious."

"Jon, I don't know what you expect me to notice but no one's acted out of the ordinary as far as I can tell, which, _apparently,_ doesn't count for much because the NotThem or whatever alters your memory of a person. Nobody's tried to kill anyone as far as I've seen, but, really, who could say, you know?" 

He winced. "Just... keep me posted. No detail is too small. Not in a case like this."

"Aye, aye," Tim said, moving to stand, stretching his shoulders back until they popped. "Was there anything else you needed? I have a great recommendation for a therapist. I really think she'd get through to you." 

"I'll keep that in mind," Jon said, bone-dry. "Have a good night." 

"When don't I?" He asked, glibly, heading towards the door. 

Tim was a second away from turning the doorknob when Jon, suddenly, couldn't contain the urge to ask one final question. "Do you recall any cases we've looked at that involved—flowers?" 

"Flowers?" He repeated, looking at Jon as if he'd lost it. "Not our usual kind-of scene, is it? Is there something, in particular, you had in mind?"

"No." Jon wasn't sure if he wanted to laugh or cry. He settled on a strangled shake of the head. "No, just a passing thought. Good night, Tim. I'll text you if anything new comes to mind." 

And that was that. 

If only. 

The cassette tapes that Tim brought him were gone by the next morning. 

Jon had listened through two of them—neither mentioned Michael—before going to bed. He woke up feeling well-rested. Refreshed, even. He didn't like it. There was something not right about it.

Jon woke-up feeling well-rested. The cassette tapes were missing. And there was a doorknob in his fridge. 

He blinked slowly, unsure if what he was seeing was really there or if he'd finally well and truly lost it. The doorknob stayed where it was, nestled between an old carton of chicken stock and a tupperware container with something molding in it. 

Something cold settled over him. Michael was watching him. Michael was _warning_ him. 

It was unnerving and horrible and Jon resented it. He burned up from the inside out with—something half-way formed between fear and rage. He chafed. 

The doorknob looked innocent enough on its own. But Jon knew better. In a burst of anger that surprised even him, he threw open his kitchen window, grabbed the doorknob, and tossed it outside as far as he could, watching until it disappeared somewhere by his neighbor's bins. 

Everything was fine. 

Everything was completely fine. 

He took a deep breath. Then he coughed up purple petals into his sink. 

Jon kept finding doorknobs.

He kept finding the _same_ doorknobs.

That is, he kept finding the doorknob he threw out the window—he knew he threw it, that was real, he knew it was—in various places around his apartment. First, he found it wrapped in his throw blanket. Next, he found it hidden behind his shampoo bottle. Then, it sat perched innocently on his windowsill, mocking him. 

It was the same doorknob. 

It was the same day.

He sat, as still as he could, criss-cross on the floor across from his living room window. He watched. He waited. The doorknob did not move. Of course, it didn't, because doorknobs didn't move on their own. That would be—mad. 

Nearly as mad as a woman made into a home for worms, or a man coughing up flower petals, or a NotThem taking over the life of someone he trusted.

Nearly as mad as a thing that was once a man driving Jon crazy through _doorknobs._

Michael wasn't going to succeed. Of course. Jon had dealt with stranger things, much more horrific things, and he was fine. He could handle himself. Even though the rest of the world seemed to be spiraling out of control, Jon was fine. He had it handled. He would figure it out: Gertrude's murder and the NotThem and Michael's past and the apparent garden growing in his lungs. There was no other option. He'd either know what he'd need to or—

Or _nothing._ He would know. He had to know. 

The doorknob stayed where it was.

What did Michael want? Why was it playing with him? What would it gain? 

He felt the familiar, rising dread of panic slowly curl through his stomach. He wished, distantly, that he'd turned down Elias when he'd offered him the Archivist position. He wished, hopelessly, that he wasn't alone—usually, he didn't mind, but there was something clingy and nauseating about his current loneliness; there was something about it that he couldn't shake. He wished, most of all, to _know._ He wanted the truth to unravel before him, all the knots pulled apart. 

The very thought of it—of knowing—anything—everything—made his teeth ache. He couldn't imagine wanting something more than he did the resolution of the mysteries that took over his life. 

He had always liked knowing things. He was always the smartest in his class. His nose was always stuck in some kind of book. He fit all the stereotypes, to an extent, but there was something about the idea of having answers about such unknowable things—about making the inexplicable suddenly, vibrantly known—that seemed to _feed_ him—it sustained him. 

The doorknob stayed where it was. 

The thing was—

Moderation wasn't exactly Jon's strong suit. 

The thing was—

Something about Michael and its complete surreality made him itch in a way he'd never experienced before. It made him hungry in a way he'd never felt hunger before, intangible and out-of-body, but still notably _his._

The thing was—

Jon had to Know. 

In the end, it was very simple.

The doorknob moved. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this just in: local writer forgets if all of gertrude's tapes were taken by the police or not and refuses to research into it for the sake of plot convenience! anyways, i know this feels kind of filler-ish but we go absolutely off the walls canon-divergent next chapter so i felt moderation was in order. 
> 
> thank you to everyone for reading! if you enjoyed please leave a review!


	3. jon gets lunch

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings for emetophobia (there's nothing graphic but at one point in the chapter jon does throw-up) and uhhh canon-typical corruption nonsense.

Jon made the executive decision to leave his apartment for a bit. Michael, he was sure, would be able to torment him no matter where he went, but maybe whatever enjoyment it got out of his paranoia would dwindle in a less personal environment. It was, at the very least, a theory he was eager to test. 

He wandered a few blocks down from where he lived, grabbed a coffee at a new cafe he'd never seen before, and then set out window-shopping, an activity he usually would have considered too tedious to endure but one he performed with great relief now. It was surprisingly comforting to constantly be on the move, especially after how dragging his morning had seemed with all its terrible excitement. And, so far at least, there was a notable lack of doorknobs in any of the window displays. 

Maybe Michael would leave him alone for the time being.

He doubted it. 

Still, he found himself relaxing as much as he ever could, comfortable with his odds in such a crowded place in the broad daylight. 

That was probably his first mistake. Jon should have known by now that horror wasn't contained by the nighttime, but it was easy to believe that it was. It was easy to want and to hope. 

His second mistake was noticing the man across the street. 

Jon had just turned onto a new street when he noticed him standing against an ivy-covered wall. There was nothing really remarkable about him—in fact, he looked kind of drab, his face tired and worn-down, and his clothes hanging off of his frame. He wasn't doing anything noteworthy, only smoking a cigarette, lazily watching as people walked by. Jon wasn't sure what drew his attention to the man, but his attention was peaked and, before he consciously noticed, he was strolling off in his direction. 

He stopped right in front of the man. His head was buzzing. He itched in the same way he did when thinking of Michael. He needed something from the man. He just didn't know what. 

The man regarded him with disinterest. "Piss off."

Jon stayed still for a long moment. He was too still for too long, and the man noticed, something shifting underneath his gaunt face until fear began to make him shake, just a bit, rancid and sweet—and the man was frozen, pinned under Jon's gaze—scared of him, and of what was about to happen—scared for the rendering he knew would occur. 

Jon's teeth ached. His head buzzed. 

He licked his lips. "Do you have something you want to tell me?" The words didn't sound like his. His voice didn't sound like his. He couldn't bring himself to care. 

"I went through a door that never existed," the man said, still shaking. 

"Whose door was it?" Jon asked because he Knew that was what he needed to ask; because he Knew that the man would have an answer; because he _needed_ the man's answer. 

The man pinched his eyes shut, a pitiful, mewling sob escaping his mouth. "Michael Shelley's." 

The buzzing in his head reached a crescendo. The man's discomfort should have bothered him. At that moment, however, he couldn't bring himself to care about anything other than the answers he would be getting. The knowledge he'd be fed. And so, Jon smiled, wide and hungry.

And he said, "Tell me everything."

The man did. 

The man was named Lawrence Peralta and though he never told Jon his name, Jon knew it anyways. Just just like he knew he had two twin girls at home, Maggie and Susan, and that he failed Calculus in his second year of university, and that he hated the game Scrabble—Jon knew all of those things and a hundred other useless, personal things about Lawrence Peralta that he did not want to know—did not ask to know—but that he knew nonetheless, as easily as breathing. 

Lawrence told Jon everything he could about Michael Shelley and his horrible, impossible door. He told him, first, however, about Michael Shelley his once-and-no-longer co-worker from the Magnus Institute. He told him about him brief time working as a research aid to the grad students who flocked to the Institute for their theses, and he told him about meek, people-pleasing Michael Shelley who started working around the same time as him, before being transferred to the Archive—promoted as one of Gertrude Robinson's research assistants. 

Lawrence told Jon that he hadn't ever, really, thought about Michael Shelley. He told him that he considered him somewhat gnat-like, annoying and cloying and clinging, and that he had been happy to see him promoted as it removed him from his life. He told him that after about a year working in the Institute he got bored with the work and decided to try his hand at banking instead because it may have been just as tedious but at least it paid better. 

Lawrence told Jon that he had a few good years at his job. Lawrence told Jon that everything was fine—better than fine, in fact—all until he walked into work one day to see a bright fuschia-colored door where there had never been a door before. 

It was that door, Lawrence said, that ruined everything.

 _Michael Shelley's door,_ he said, his voice shaking—his body shaking, really, held up only by the ivy-covered wall he leaned against—as he recounted his story, _Michael Shelley's door led me to hell._

Lawrence told Jon, his story still flowing out smoothly despite his shaking and his dread and his fear, about all the horrors he'd seen and felt and touched and tasted. He told Jon about his nightmares and dreams and secrets buried so deeply beneath layers of trauma that Lawrence didn't remember the truth of them until now. He told Jon that after days or weeks or months spent within Michael Shelley's door he came across the man himself, laying across a chaise lounge, in the center of his labyrinth. 

Lawrence told Jon that, at first, he wasn't sure if it was indeed his once-and-no-longer co-worker but then Michael Shelley had laughed, annoying and cloying and clinging, and he knew and he cried and he begged and Michael Shelley who was no-longer Michael Shelley but a monster _—a thing—_ simply smiled with too many teeth and told him it was quite hungry.

Lawrence told Jon that he ran and he couldn't, exactly, perfectly, remember how he got out of the door. He told Jon, his voice nearly shot, his eyes clouded and hollow, that sometimes he wasn't sure he'd ever left, that sometimes he could still hear Michael's laughter, echoing. 

Lawrence Peralta told Jon more than he wanted to, more than he would have had he been given any real choice, and Jon just took it all, uncaring, unfeeling, unaffected by his sniffling and sniveling and shaking. Jon took everything he had left—whatever strength he'd been able to build up since his encounter with Michael—and consumed it fully. 

And Jon left Lawrence Peralta where he found him, slouched against an ivy-covered wall, suddenly pale-as-death, his heart beating sluggishly, tears staining his cheeks. 

Jon left, uncaring, unconcerned, the buzz in his head stronger than ever.

Jon counted to three to center himself. Then he stumbled into the cramped bathroom of his apartment, falling before the toilet, and throwing up. There wasn't anything for him to throw-up, though, and once he exhausted all the bile in his body, he was left dry-heaving. He tilted his head to the side, pressing his face against the cool tile of his bathroom wall. He felt clammy and nauseous, the reality of what had happened—what he'd _done—_ crushing itself down on him.

He'd _—what?_

What had he done? 

He'd found a man who just so happened to have an answer to a question he so desperately wanted answered, and he was able to take that knowledge from him, he was able to—to compel him into it, somehow. He'd let that man rip himself apart just so he could know more about Michael. He'd let someone retraumatize themselves just to make things easier on himself. 

Worse still, in the moment, while Lawrence Peralta was giving his statement, Jon hadn't cared. He could see that he needed help. He could see that telling his story was hurting him as much as it was helping Jon, and he hadn't cared.

Jon hadn't wanted to help him or comfort him or ease his fear. Jon had wanted him scared and shaking. Some part of him—some horrible, monstrous part—had reveled at his fear, had preened at it. 

He gagged. 

How could he have done that?

Jon didn't want the answer, though it came to him quite easily. 

_Because he wanted to Know._

He took a shallow breath. His knees hurt from pressing into the floor, but he refused to move, his nausea refusing to recede. He knew that however horrible what he had done to Lawrence Peralta was, his current predicament was the result of his guilt, rather than any true sickness—and he knew that because after speaking to Lawrence Peralta, Jon felt better than he had in months. 

He felt _aware._

He felt _awake._

He gagged again. 

Jon was sitting on his sofa, staring at his wall, when it returned. He had not heard the tell-tale sound of a door's squeaking hinges this time. The only thing that alerted him to Michael's presence was the shifting, looming shadow that simply appeared against the wall, and then Michael, its long hair dragging on the floor behind it, wearing a garish plum suit, crossed into Jon's peripherals, settling, once again, on the chair across from him. 

The suddenness of it all did not frighten Jon. 

At the moment, he wasn't sure anything could possibly frighten him more than himself. 

Michael looked—pleased. Though, pleased wasn't exactly the right word for the look that it wore as it regarded Jon. 

Like the last time it visited him—or the last time he was aware of it, at least—Michael spoke first. "You look tired, Archivist. Did you not appreciate the rest I gave you?"

Jon blinked at him, slowly. His head felt like it was full of cotton and his mouth felt separate from himself entirely. The last time he'd spoken he destroyed a man. What if he did the same thing to Michael? Would it even matter, since Michael was no longer a man? Would it even work? He did not feel eager to find out. 

After a long moment, one that should have, by all accounts, been uncomfortably long, Jon found his voice. "You've been stealing my statements." 

It wasn't a question. 

Michael tittered, its fingers twisting together in a way fingers should not have been able to twist. "Have I?"

Jon's whole head felt unbearably heavy. He watched Michael's hands as they continued to move and spasm and shape themselves into impossible formations—he watched until they began to invert and the colors began to bleed away and his eyes began to sting. Perhaps some things weren't meant to be watched. "I know who you are—or were—now." 

"Oh, Archivist," it said, nearly purring, "I doubt that."

He picked a piece of lint off of his pants. Then he asked, making sure to smooth out any possible intent or urge to know from his voice before asking it—desperate to not have what happened to Lawrence Peralta happen again and unsure how else to stop it—looking at Michael through his eyelashes, "How long has it been since you were Michael Shelley?" 

The smile it wore on its face froze, stretching wide into a grimace, stretching wider and wider, before tugging down into a frown that served as passably human. Its voice grated like nails, raising the hair on Jon's arms, urging him to hide. "You should be careful, Archivist, about what you ask," it tapped its nails together in something like contemplation, "Not everything out in the world is as friendly as I am." 

Jon ignored its warning. "How long will it be before I'm no longer Jonathan Sims?" 

Michael laughed, a horrible sound. "Jonathan Sims?" It hummed, regarding him with something near pity. "Archivist you gave that up before we were acquainted. It's a skin that no longer fits."

"I see," Jon said, something bitter pinching his voice. 

"You don't," Michael said, almost gentle, "Not yet. But you will, Archivist. You'll Know and I'll Twist and—"

"No," he interrupted firmly, "I don't _want_ to Know. I don't want it—whatever it is. I don't—I don't—" 

It tapped its fingers together, seeming to ignore his fit. "You can lie to others, Archivist. You can even lie to yourself. But you cannot lie to me. I am the Twisting Deceit, Archivist. I cannot be fooled." 

Jon glared. "You're wrong—"

"I thought you'd be in a better mood, having been fed."

That caught him off guard. "I—I haven't eaten anything today." 

Michael smiled and Jon knew it was going to say something terrible. "Haven't you? Would darling Lawrence agree?" 

"Shut up," Jon said, hunching forward, digging his nails into his palms, his familiar nauseous guilt bubbling up. "I don't—I didn't..." 

And, then, Michael was there, its body hunched over Jon, its awful fingers running down his face, like static against his skin. It was humming something under its breath, an imitation of comfort, and Jon shuddered—from the touch or the song or both, he wasn't sure. Slowly, despite all logic, its ministrations began to lull him back into breathing. The slight itch-burn-sting of its fingers jolted him back to himself with surprising gentleness. 

Michael, still close to him, still humming, still _touching,_ said, "I've never known anyone who stumbled into this so unaware. You'll adjust, Archivist. You'd be dead if you couldn't."

That did nothing to make him feel better. It was frustration that caused him to ask, forcefully, "What is _this?"_

Michael giggled, causing colors to flash behind his eyelids. "You can't escape your nature any more than I can, Archivist." 

"Why can you never answer any of my questions?"

"Oh, but I have," it said, teeth gleaming in its mouth, "I've answered far more than I should have. But you are fun, Archivist. I can't help if I find you... interesting." 

"But—"

Michael was gone before Jon could even finish his thought. 

He was dreaming.

Maybe.

Probably. 

His head was not his own. Neither was his body—so short and stooped, feet pressed into heels made to tower, a dark, swinging head of hair bouncing behind him.

He was not Jon. He was Jon. He was not Jane. He was Jane. He was neither. He was both. Jon-Jane. Jane-Jon. Over and over and over again. In his dream, he was Jane Prentiss. In his dream, he was himself. They were—the same here. They had the same _itch._

Jane Prentiss had said, once, in another time, "It is not the patterns that enthrall me. I’m not one of those fools chasing fractals; no, it’s what sings behind them." 

Jon hadn't understood. He hadn't Known the appeal—the draw—the itch—but now, here, dreaming, he did. He could hear the song. The song of a home and of love. The song that wrapped Jane up nice and tight, eating her, feeding her, helping her. Jon could hear the song.

It was beautiful. It was horrible.

Jon-Jane, Jane-Jon cried and screamed. It hurt. It took and it took and it took and all they could say was _thank you_ _,_ pleased and grateful and loved even as it dug everything out of them to make them _right—_ to make them a home. 

And Jon was scared. His head was not his own. 

Jane Prentiss went into her attic because she heard the song, the beautiful, horrible, screeching song of something that wanted to be Known, and Jon could feel the same song rising up in him, tangling and clawing its way through him. 

The palm of his left hand pulsed painfully. He ignored it. 

It was a dream, after all. Dreams weren't able to hurt him. Call to him and entrance him, sure, but hurt him? Who would hurt him here? Not the song. Not the growing, twining thing spreading through him. No, he-she _-they_ were loved. Jane with her wasps' nest and Jon with his—

No. 

_No._

This was not love. This Crawling Rot—this Filth—this Corruption—was _not_ love. It did not love him. It only wanted him to love it.

Jane Prentiss watched her wasps' nest. She let it sing to her and she left the rot climb inside of her to find a home. And she loved it. And she _—merged._ She became more, just as Jon was becoming more, just as Michael became more—

And the song was still going, sweet like decay, and Jon was crying. Jane was crying. It was beautiful. It was horrible. 

And the song was still going.

There were tears on his face. He didn't know why. He was home. He was held. 

And the song was still going.

It had hurt her at first—it had hurt to let in the first of the Hive. It had come to her slowly, gently, like a mother brushing a hand over her baby's cheek. And it had hurt, wriggling its way inside of her. She did not complain, though. She knew her duty and she knew her heart, and the hive had such beautiful promises for her—

And the song was still going. 

He did not like it. He did not want it. He did not. He did not. He did not. He could feel it, though. Inside of him. Not worms. He knew how those felt. He could feel something else—something growing—something sweeter—

And the song was still going.

She-he _-they_ loved it. The promise. The feeling. The song. 

They were loved. Jon-Jane. They were loved. They were home. They were Known. 

Known?

No.

Jon was not Jane. Jane was not Jon. 

His head was his own. His body was his own—tall and lanky, glasses slipping perpetually down his nose, hair streaked grey at the temples. The song was sweet. It sounded like home and love and Jon ached against it, the thing growing within him yearned and wanted, but that thing was not him, and he Knew that it wasn't, and the part of him that Knew these things preened and puffed and—

The song stopped. 

Jon blinked awake, slowly, still groggy, to find sunlight streaming in from the gap between his curtains. His eyes were stinging. He could not remember his dream. 

He was frowning into his mostly empty pantry when his phone went off. There was only one person he thought would call him and, sure enough, it was Tim. 

He accepted the call with strange sense of eagerness. "Hello?" 

Tim's voice came through tinny and breathless. It sounded like he was walking down a street. "Jon? Yes, hi. Are you busy right now?" 

"I'm on leave."

There was a slight pause. "I know that, but are you busy?"

Jon stifled a sigh. "I'm on leave," he repeated, slightly impatient, "I assumed the implication would be that no, I am not busy." 

"I didn't want to make any assumptions," Tim snapped, "How dare I assume that you could have friends or a social life of any sort." 

"Yes, well—" he cleared his throat, unsure what, if anything, he could say after that. "What was it you needed?" 

"I was doing some thinking last night about our... little table problem. In the Dodds statement, Jacob only believed his sister _after_ he found her polaroids. So I was thinking, what makes the polaroids immune to its—power... or whatever? And, after doing some research into it, I think it has something to do with analog technologies and the way they can be instantly developed. So any photos, like polaroids, would be untouched by the—the power that erases our memories. Which makes me think that any analog tape recorded would—"

"—reveal the true voice of a person," Jon finished for him, his heart rattling in his chest. 

He could hear the smile in Tim's voice. "Exactly! If I'm right and it can't override your tapes then we can just listen through the statements you recorded before the table was delivered and try to find the voice that doesn't match up."

"That will only account for Sasha and Martin and, maybe, Elias, I think—"

"—yes, but if it's not any of them, it'll still narrow down our search."

"Could you start listening through tapes?" Jon asked, hope thrumming desperately through him. "Obviously, you won't be able to get through all of them, but when I get back I'll help, as well."

"Already on it, boss. I've gone through two, so far, but both were just you monologuing so there's been nothing really insidious, yet. I'll keep you posted." 

Jon smiled, comfortable knowing it went unseen. "Tim, this is—Just...good work. This feels like the exact break we needed."

Tim laughed, bringing Jon back to a time when they both worked in the research department, sharing a corner of the office. "Is this another one of those things that you seem to just Know?"

"Maybe," Jon said, slowly, his good-mood curdling. "Maybe." 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> writing this chapter just made me want to write corruption!jon which i know this fic could technically fall under, but, like, i mean straight-up corruption jon, not just infected-by-the-corruption jon, hm? also. i have a lot of feelings for jane prentiss which i, personally, do not have the desire to unpack. also (pt 2) i got really sad realizing how few women were in this (ie none so far and georgie wont appear until chapter 8 rip) so jane HAD to be shoehorned in. @ the bechdel test i am so sorry :( 
> 
> also (pt 3) we may have some monster jon. as a treat (with great care given towards issues of morality/humanity/jon's innate desire to help people, of course).
> 
> last thing i wanted to say is the next few chapters might take a week to get up rather than half a week since my university courses have started up again & trying the balance everything will be a bit of an adjustment. as always, if you enjoyed, please leave a review!


	4. measure of trust

There was a door in his apartment.

It was wedged in the normally empty space between his bedroom wardrobe and bathroom door, far from innocuous, painted a flaking lime green with an ornate, golden handle. Whenever he passed it—which was, unfortunately, frequent given its location—he could feel great, horrible waves of heat pulse out away from it and, sometimes, late at night, he could hear a _humming._

It was not like any song he'd ever heard before. It was not pleasant or catchy or anything that Jon wanted to hear. That did not stop the humming, though. It was Michael, he knew. It sounded just like whatever it had hummed under its breath to calm Jon the night before. 

The _why_ escaped him still. 

Why was Michael humming? 

He found himself sitting on the edge of his bed, watching the door, waiting for—well.

He waited. He watched. Some part of him, a part that he didn't want to dwell on, a part that was hungry, starved, wanted to _Know._ He wanted to Know what was behind the door. He wanted to Know why Michael did what it did. He wanted to Know everything. He wanted to rip and tug and take whatever knowledge he could and he wanted to gorge himself on it. 

He watched. He waited. He wanted. 

Jon swallowed. He felt split in two. What he'd done—what he could, apparently, do—was wrong. It was monstrous and, by extension, he was monstrous, too. In one fell swoop, he'd become something not too far apart from the horror stories he studied. What would Helen Richardson think about him? What would Melanie King? What would any of the countless, traumatized individuals who suffered for the pleasure of monsters—monsters like Jon seemed to be turning into—think? 

_How long will it be before I'm no longer Jonathan Sims?_

His eyes stung. He felt choked.

It was absurd. He'd never been one to place much stock into arguments about nature versus nurture. Monsters always seemed to just be monsters. It was simple. A childlike view of the world, maybe, but one that was comfortable to fit into, given his line of work. Now though—

Now he couldn't help but wonder what that made him.

If monsters were always monsters did he ever have a chance? If monsters were always monsters why did he feel so sick at the thought of what he'd done? He didn't feel sick enough, however. He could tell. Because if he felt sick enough there wouldn't be a part of him that wanted to do it again—that wanted to pick his way through someone else's head just for the sake of Knowing. 

If monsters were monsters were monsters...

He couldn't think. His room was unbearably hot. The humming was growing. He was a monster. 

Something shuffled behind the door, rattling the hinges. 

He watched. He waited. He decided to sleep on the couch. 

The door was gone in the morning. When he shuffled into his room, desperate for a shower, the space was once again untouched. There was no sign that a door had ever been shoved into existence where it shouldn't have been in the first place. Nothing looked out of place. Nothing looked changed. 

Except—

Except. 

Jon threw himself onto his bed, yearning for some sort of adolescent-projection of safety, and found, as he curled around his pillow, a single, blonde hair resting beside him. 

It was Michael's. There was no one else it could belong to. 

He should have been frightened, probably. He should have been many things, several times over, in many different ways. He was never good at following the garden path, though. 

Michael made Jon's brain buzz. Its presence made his mouth taste like copper and marshmallow fluff, acidic and sugary-sweet. It hurt, being around it. It made him feel like he was upside-down on a rollercoaster, his stomach in his throat, his brain dripping out of his eyes. It left him with migraines and a ringing in his ears and a heart that was fluttering too fast in his chest. It left him clammy and jumpy and—somehow—inexplicably _—happy._

It was absurd and pathetic. 

Later, when the coughing started again, Jon simply sat up, bracing himself to collect the petals in his palms. The frequency of his fits was growing faster, just as the intensity of them was growing stronger, but he'd still yet to find any possible explanation or solution to his problem. If he had the energy left to care, he imagined he'd be quite concerned. As it was, he simply dropped the petals on his side table—they were much closer to full flowers now, with short stems and smatterings of leaves—and laid back down. 

Tim was a breath of fresh air when he rolled into Jon's apartment the next day. He'd come straight from the Archives, stopping only to pick up two coffees, for which Jon was incredibly thankful. They'd both settled down on the sofa, Tim's stuffed messenger bag sitting between them, filled, Jon knew, with a mix of tapes and files that might, somehow, be useful for their ongoing investigation. 

It was—nice. Being around Tim helped lift the fear and fog from his mind. 

And so, in an unusual show of self-restraint, he was perfectly content to let Tim take the reigns of the conversations. 

"It's so frustrating," Tim said, slumping back, "I wish digital media stayed the same and analog changed—wouldn't that be so much easier? I have photos of everyone from the office on my phone. It'd be quick work, then." 

Jon smiled, barely a quirk of his mouth. "If you find it so awful to listen to my voice outside of work hours, you can just say."

"Oh, please, Jon. I want answers just as badly as—" Tim cut himself off with a slow blink, turning to look at him with disbelief. "Was that a _joke?_ Are you making jokes?"

"It's been known to happen," he said, suddenly feeling rigid in his own skin. 

Tim continued to stare, his mouth slowly curling up into a toothy grin, his eyes crinkling as he let out a rib-aching laugh. Jon couldn't help but smile a bit wider in response. "I've worked with you for almost three years now and I don't know if I've ever heard you make a joke before. Are you feeling alright?"

"Absolutely peachy," he said. 

"Hey now, no need to be so defensive, boss. You're making jokes. That's—that's good. Maybe there's something to this trauma break, eh?"

Jon raised an eyebrow, pushing aside just how off-put he was in the face of—friendship? Camaraderie? It felt so foreign to him now. "Something besides a cover to hide our investigation, you mean?" 

"Back to business as usual, then. Right on," Tim sighed, the long-suffering nature hindered by the smile still tugging on the corner of his mouth. "I was able to pull a few files that seem to be about your Michael, if you want to start there?"

"Oh, uh, yes—well," Jon grimaced, "I don't think that will be necessary." 

"It won't be necessary," Tim repeated, skepticism and annoyance competing in his tone. "And why, pray tell, is that?"

He winced. "I've...managed to discover who he was before he became whatever it is that he is."

"And? Who was he?" 

"His name—his full name—was Michael Shelley. He was a research assistant for Gertrude starting in 2006. At some point, before 2010, he transformed into what we now know him as."

Tim watched him for a long moment. "I see. I just have two questions for you, if that's alright?" He did not wait for Jon to agree before continuing. "Did you get this information from Michael? Because, if so, kudos, boss. I thought seducing information out of people was my specialty. Also—were you planning on sharing this anytime soon, or were you just going to let me muck around in the dark for a bit? Just curious." 

Jon shifted restlessly, as horrible, gnawing guilt began to pool in his stomach. He did not like the way Tim was looking at him. He was angry, sure, but behind the anger—worse than the anger, in fact—Jon could see genuine hurt lurking about. Not for the first time, he was reminded why he wasn't able to manage keeping people around him long-term. He was never able to do the right things. He always ended up ruining everything with his own social ineptitude and his inability to connect. 

He thought of Tim's demands of their partnership: _You need to keep me in the loop the entire time, no matter what you're doing. I want to know what's going on._

He thought about Lawrence Peralta. 

He wondered, his dread rising slowly until it was nearly suffocating him, which would be worse: for Tim to look at him and see a monster or for Tim to believe he didn't trust him. He wondered which he'd consider worse. He wondered, a lot. 

Then, he spoke up. "I didn't—I haven't been intentionally keeping this from you. I just...I don't know how to explain—I don't know how to tell you how I learned it. And I was—and I _am_ scared by it. I really didn't—that is...I trust you, Tim. Please, if anything, believe that." 

"So, I'm assuming you haven't seduced Michael, then?" Tim asked, trying to sound light-hearted in the face of Jon's rambling not-explanation and failing miserably. 

"No," Jon agreed, "I haven't seduced Michael. I doubt, even if I... seduced him, that I would get anything worthwhile out of it. He seems far more focused on tormenting me than helping in any substantial way." 

"Little boy tugging on little girls pigtails?" Tim asked, his false cheer grating. 

He blinked. "What—no. Nothing of the sorts. I mean he genuinely torments me with—with doors and doorknobs, and he lies, constantly, and I think that he slept in my bed because there was—there was a hair on my pillow that had to have belonged to him, so. No, I do not think it's a—a _pigtail_ situation at all. The very idea is laughable."

Jon took a brief pause to breathe when he felt it. A tickle in the back of his throat. 

He gave a half-hearted attempt to clear his throat, hoping against hope that he was just experiencing seasonal allergies. No luck. In the blink of an eye, he was hunched forward coughing wetly, coughing and coughing and coughing, for so long that Tim started to shift around in concern, coughing and coughing and coughing, until, at last, in his cupped hands, a wilted flower, stem intact, slick with his blood, appeared. 

"Did you just cough up a flower?" Tim asked, sounding very much like he did not want the answer. 

Jon sighed, still slightly winded. "Yes. It's a... thing that's been happening recently." 

"The other week when you asked me about flower-related cases you were..."

"Trying to research into the phenomena. Obviously, it's supernatural in some way, I just haven't managed to figure out how." 

Tim nodded. "Right. Of course. You have flowers growing in your lungs—"

"I don't know if they're growing in my lungs—"

"Where else would they be coming from?" Tim looked like he couldn't quite decide if he wanted to laugh or cry. "Jon—what the hell?" 

Jon frowned. "I realize this looks concerning, but—"

"No," Tim interrupted. "No, buts. Is there any other secret you've been keeping from me, boss? I'd hate for anything else to ruin our agreement of transparency."

He winced. "Well, I—I think I may have hurt someone, quite badly." 

"You're going to need to elaborate on that," Tim said. 

Jon would have rather coughed up another flower.

And yet, here he was.

Trust was a curious, terrifying thing. It was something that could pop into existence with little to no prelude, and just upend the established way of things. He wondered, once again, if Tim would hate him after hearing the full, awful truth of what had been going on. He found himself hoping he wouldn't. 

"I didn't learn about Michael's past from Michael," Jon said, trying to piece the story together in a way that wouldn't make him sound insane. "Michael, whenever he visits—and he does visit, quite a lot, actually—doesn't do much more than talk in circles or, I suppose, threaten me. But he's slipped up enough that I knew he probably worked at the Archive, at some point, which made me... curious."

"Yes, you've told me all of this before," Tim said, still frowning. "I brought you two dozen or so tapes last week because of your curiosity. And, let me guess: you didn't find out about Michael with the tapes." 

He shook his head. "No. Michael actually took all of the tapes. I barely made a dent in them before they were gone. Which just made me _—want_ more. I... I don't know how to describe it except I was so focused on understanding and Knowing who Michael was and what happened to him that I couldn't focus on anything else. I could only focus on how much I wanted to Know him—to Know everything I possibly could about him.

"I just _wanted_ for a whole afternoon, until I couldn't sit in here anymore and decided to go on a walk. Get some fresh air. Clear my head. Only, I think I wanted to Know so badly that I brought myself to someone who could... feed my interest. I don't know how else to put it, really."

Tim seemed appropriately unsettled. "Law of attraction? You get back what you put into the universe?" 

"No," Jon said immediately, "No, this... this wasn't like that. It wasn't... good." He swallowed, trying to ignore his rising nausea. "I found a man named Lawrence Peralta. He never told me his name, but I Know it anyways. I don't know why I stopped to talk to him, there was no reason to, but I did and I—I somehow was able to... compel a story out of him that explained more about Michael. He was a former co-worker of his who had the misfortune of becoming a victim of his doors."

He stopped for a moment to collect himself, before continuing, "He did not want to tell me his story. He was scared the whole time. He was sobbing and shaking and I just—I just stood and listened and let him tell me. I made him tell me because I wanted to Know. And now—now I don't think I'll be able to _stop_ Knowing things. I think I—I _touched_ something that I can't come back from. Do you understand? I think... I think—I think I'm becoming something... something not human." 

"Alright," Tim said, slowly. "Alright. I can honestly say that was not the explanation I was expecting."

Jon frowned, feeling _—slighted_ somehow. "Is that all you have to say? Really?"

"Oh, I'm sorry, boss! Am I not processing the fact that you think your becoming—what? A monster?—well enough for you? Pardon me, for not reacting appropriately enough! It's just that this whole situation feels slightly fucking absurd!"

He deflated. "So you don't believe me."

Tim groaned. "This isn't a believe or disbelieve kind of situation, Jon! It's just—well—prove it."

"Excuse me?" He couldn't possibly have meant what it sounded like.

"Prove it to me. I want you to—compel, or whatever, something out of me. Then I'll know if this is something that's really happening or if you've just... cracked from the stress." 

Jon was certain, as he'd never been certain of anything before, that Tim was an idiot. "Did you just ignore everything I said? I traumatized that man and you want me to do the same to you?"

"Don't be daft," Tim said as if Jon was being unreasonable. "Obviously, I don't want you to ask me anything traumatizing. Just... ask me something that I usually wouldn't want to answer; something embarrassing or, I don't know, you're the expert here."

Jon was about to snap back something about most certainly not being an expert when he felt... something begin to buzz in his head. It buzzed and buzzed, drowning out the concerns that were resting on his tongue, drowning out everything except a strange sort of single-minded focus that felt both familiar and ill-fitting, like a coat that was too tight, constricting movement and air and—

His head buzzed. He watched. He waited. Tim seemed caught, sitting rigid and still, under his gaze. His head buzzed. He wanted. The part of him that was growing stronger every day, the part that pushed the Knowing of things at him, preened. Tim looked at him with slow-blooming dread. He was very, nearly afraid. The preening grew stronger. His head buzzed. He Knew, instantly, instinctively, what he needed to ask.

The question fell from his mouth unbidden. "Why are you helping me investigate the NotThem?" 

The answer came without any hesitation.

"At first, I agreed to help because I was worried about what you would do when investigating on your own. It's not that I thought you were crazy, but you'd been so paranoid lately that I honestly wasn't too surprised when you called me into your office and told me about your suspicions. I thought if I could keep an eye on you, push you into taking a damn break, that things would get better around the office, again. Back to normal, or as normal as anything could be after Prentiss."

He took a deep breath, "I didn't _not_ believe you, though. The way you explained everything felt... right. So, at the very least, I believed that you believed the NotThem was real. And then I started looking at the information you gave me, and I realized there might have been actual solid evidence backing up your claims. I kept researching into similar cases and the more I read, the more I decided you were right and someone was taken and replaced by the NotThem.

"I—I don't know why I told you all of that. I didn't mean—" Tim was shaking, his hands digging into one another, as he looked at Jon with an expression he did not wish to read. 

Jon stayed as still as he could, ignoring the sick feeling of satisfaction that washed over him, waiting for the buzz to fade into nothing, before speaking again. "I'm sorry."

There was a brief pause. Then, Tim shook his head harshly. "Don't be. I asked you to do it and you—you did." He laughed without any humor. "So you can make people tell you things."

It wasn't a question, but Jon supposed it didn't need to be. "Yes. Yes, I guess I can—but, please, believe me when I say I don't want to. I don't want whatever it is that's letting me do this." 

"Trust you, you mean?" Tim asked, something bitter twisting across his face.

"Is that too much to ask for, now?"

Jon couldn't bring himself to look at Tim anymore. He did not want to see fear or disgust or, far worse than anything else, pity in his eyes. He did not want to face the fallout of ruining another potentially good thing. He felt... out-of-body. He imagined that none of the other monsters in the stories he chronicled felt as badly as he did at that moment—in any of the moments he'd had over the last few days, actually. 

He was jolted out of his thoughts by Tim. He was—holding his hand, squeezing with a pressure that probably should have been painful. Jon welcomed it. He squeezed back. "It's not," Tim said, fierce in a way he hadn't anticipated. "Too much to ask, that is. I trust you. Flower-coughing and compelling and all."

"If you're uncomfortable, I'd understand and—"

"Shut up, Jon," Tim was still holding his hand. It was nice. "We're going to figure all of this out. We're going to stop the NotThem and we're going to figure out what's going on with you and everything is going to be okay. Alright?" 

"I—yes. Alright," he agreed, feeling, of all things, choked-up.

Tim nodded. "Okay. Good. I'm going to hug you now—if that's fine with you?" 

Jon laughed, only slightly strangled. "I suppose that would be fine." 

Jon woke up with a jolt that implied he'd been suffering from a nightmare he could no longer remember. His room was dark. There was no light streaming in behind the curtains and no sound coming from the street. This happened every so often. Insomnia usually plagued him more than night terrors, but recently both seemed to be equal opportunity annoyances.

He didn't roll over to check the time. He normally would have, but something was stopping him this time. He didn't know what. Instead, he just laid in his bed, breathing softly, still warm and comfortable under his blankets. 

There was a person in his room. 

He's not sure what about them caught his attention, but he Knew it to be true. They stood just out of sight, loitering in the dark corners that he couldn't see. This didn't frighten him, though perhaps it should have. He simply laid in his bed, breathing softly, warm and comfortable under his blankets. 

The person spoke. They had a familiar voice, but one he couldn't place. He felt like he should have known it. "I thought it was pronounced Ka-lee-o-pee?"

"What are you talking about?" he asked, head muddled. 

"It's just a scratch, Jon. I'll be fine. Can we begin?"

They weren't making any sense. His head ached. "How do you know my name? Who are you?" 

The person continued, ignoring his questions. "I should really quit, you know. We—we all should. I don't think this is a normal job. I—I don't think this is a safe job."

"Please." Jon's ears were ringing. His mouth tasted like copper. "What do you want?"

"Jon—Jon, I think there's someone here. Hello? I see you. Show yourself!"

His heart was pounding. He did not move. He could barely think. "I don't—I don't understand. What do you want?"

"It doesn't work like that," A new voice answered. This one he knew, though he'd never spoken to them before. 

"Gertrude? I—what? You're dead." The world was slipping around him. He was in bed, but he was not. He was dropping down, through the floor, through everything, just drop—drop _—dropping._

Gertrude Robinson laughed. The world inverted into technicolor. "Indeed, I am. Es Mentiras, and all that. I was never one for the truth, anyways." 

He was in bed. He could feel something cold and wet fall over him. He was standing up. When had he stood up? When had he moved? He couldn't see anything. "I'm sorry, but I don't—I don't—"

"Honestly, Jonathan." It was a new voice. A new person. "What's the matter with you? Pull yourself together."

His face was wet. His eyes stung. Had he been crying? He breathed in through his nose. It pushed blood to the back of his throat. Was his nose bleeding? He didn't reach up to check. The voice—the voice was horrible and familiar and wrong, he hated it, he didn't want to hear it—was chiding and warm and he knew it. 

"Nan?" He was crying. His nose was bleeding. He was in bed. Everything was fine. "Nan, what are you doing here?"

She clucked her tongue, and the familiarity of it made him cry harder. He should have gotten up to greet her. He did not move. His ears were ringing. "Well, I have to keep an eye on what you're up to, don't I? Who knows what kind of nonsense you'd get up to without me watching you."

Jon was upside down. He was swinging off of something tall and high, and he was falling. The colors blurred before his eyes. There was no color. It was dark. He was in bed. "You have to leave. You need to go, Nan. It's not safe here, you need to—to... Nan?" 

"Yes, azizam?" 

He let out a wounded sound. This wasn't right. She shouldn't have been in London. She shouldn't have been alive. "You—who are you? You aren't my grandmother. Who are you?"

"Oh, gumdrop, what's gotten into you?" Another voice. 

He was in bed. He was tipping into a cyclone. His face was wet. Had he been crying? He remembered the voice. The room lit up neon. "Mom?"

His mother sighed, soft and sweet and Jon cried and cried and bled and bled, and she said, "It'll just be a quick pop down to the shops. We'll be right back. I promise." 

"No," he said, frantic. His mouth tasted like copper. He knew how this ended. "No, don't go. Don't go—"

"Oh, gumdrop, what's gotten into you?" She repeated. It was worse this time. "Oh, gumdrop what's gotten into you?" Again. And then, "Oh, gumdrop what's gotten into you?" Her voice was falling away until it wasn't her voice; until it wasn't any voice; until it was completely and unchangeably distorted. 

And Jon just laid in his bed, breathing softly, still warm and comfortable under his blankets. His face was wet. Had he been crying? 

Michael was taller than usual today. It loomed over Jon for a moment before heading to its customary seat. Its legs sprawled out too far and, if Jon paid too much attention, he could make out the way its ankles and knees rolled and twisted in ways that were, frankly, sickening to watch. Its hair curled out, a big puff of hair a-top its head as if it had stuck its finger into a light socket. 

Jon nursed his cup of tea and just watched it for a moment. He felt... at ease. That would probably be a mistake in the long run. "I don't like the doors."

"I have no idea what you mean, Archivist," it said, draping itself horizontally across the chair. "What doors?"

It was lying, but, then again, it always lied. At least, through the coyness, it was apparent. "I wish you wouldn't do that. I'm having enough time differentiating reality on my own."

Michael laughed and it felt like lightning against his skin. "Where's the fun in dealing with reality? Isn't it boring?"

"I used to be able to sleep," Jon said. 

It pouted, or did whatever counted as a pout when its face was as—drifting as it was. "You sleep plenty now, Archivist. You sleep all day and all night, drifting and dozing and dreaming. It's... tedious"

He sighed, inexplicably charmed. "If you're not going to stop with the doors could you at least keep them quiet. The humming has been—quite aggressive, recently."

Michael went still. Jon hadn't noticed how... in movement it constantly was until, suddenly, there was an absence. It looked at Jon, eyes dizzying. "There are many sounds beyond my doors, Archivist, but humming is not one of them. Whatever you're hearing isn't my doing." 

Jon set his cup down. "Oh."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorely tempted to add "monster flirting" as a tag because that's undoubtedly what michael is trying (and somehow not failing) to do. also, i realize for a hanahaki fic, it's kind of on the backburner atm, but don't worry! things can only get worse! 
> 
> brief authorial concern: does tim sound in character? i am moderately confident in how i write jon and michael, but tim just fills me with ?????
> 
> as always, if you enjoyed please leave a review! like i mentioned last time, updates will probably take about a week to post from now on, so, hopefully, this longer chapter will help tide things over.


	5. business as usual

Being back at the Archives was startlingly refreshing. 

He'd expected his return to be harder than it was. He'd assumed that crossing through the threshold and walking over the ragged argyle carpet would—jolt something in him. A fight or flight response, maybe, or the crawling, familiar dread that seemed to hang around him ever since Prentiss. In fact, he imagined that dread should have been even worse, knowing what he now knew.

It wasn't, though.

That wasn't to say that being back was pleasant. 

Jon had never noticed—or, perhaps, never been affected by—the strangeness in the Archives before. He'd known that some statement-givers and researchers considered the place off-putting, or, however juvenile it seemed, spooky. He'd just never experienced that oddness himself. 

He did now. As he walked down the fluorescent-lit hallways, deeper and deeper into the building, closer and closer to his office, he thought he understood. He could feel the strangeness of the building lingering on his skin. He could feel the oddness trailing at his steps. He felt as if everything was knocked askew an inch. That is, he felt _wrong._

Jon had arrived early enough in the day that there should have been no one else in the building except for him, but, despite that—

He was being watched. 

He could feel someone—something, maybe—watching him, unnoticed, unconcerned. Just...watching. He could feel eyes following him, tracking his every move, cataloging his every breath. The weight of being seen was heavy on his shoulders. Even worse, he could also feel the faint, hair-raising sensation of someone standing right behind him, too close for comfort, nearly brushing against his back, unprovoked and unwanted, but whenever he turned around he was alone. 

There was no one there. Of course, there wasn't. There wouldn't be anyone there, because there was no one really watching him. There couldn't be anyone watching him, because he was alone. There was no one there. It was—residual paranoia from Prentiss' attack or anxiety over the NotThem or rattling, second-hand fear for any of the other horror stories he had locked away in his brain.

There was no one behind him. There was no one watching him. He was alone.

If he'd been feeling in any way rational he would have accepted the reasonable explanation laid at his feet. 

Jon was not feeling rational, however. There was something about coughing up flowers and ripping knowledge from other people without permission that endeared him to the irrational. The pucker-mark scars that littered his body ached in time. Something that wasn't hunger but also wasn't _not_ hunger twisted through him. He was wretched, wasn't he?

He walked further into the Archives. His loafers sounded muffled against the threadbare carpet. The lights buzzed. The watching continued. It felt stronger the further along he went, heavier, more concrete. It draped over him like a second skin, continuously, patiently, watching and watching and Watching and—

It wasn't paranoia. He Knew it wasn't. 

The Watching felt... _right._ Not safe, not kind, not good, but...right. It felt as if the Watching belonged to him—or, perhaps, more accurately, he belonged to the Watching. It didn't hurt. It didn't do anything to him, except coil around him, digging in and rooting for—something. It wasn't anything he could really describe, it just...was. Jon walked and was Watched and he felt...right. 

That realization—that knowledge that he found comfort being in a place that felt so... _wrong—_ so malevolent, hooking its way into him every moment he spent inside, so hungry, so callous, so unsympathetic in what pain it could cause, uncaring in what it feasted on only that it could feast—the idea that he found comfort in a place that _watched—_ was horrifying.

That comfort was worse than the Watching itself. 

His palms were sweating. There were eyes—dozens, hundreds, thousands—on the back of his neck, just Watching. He couldn't know for sure, but as his discomfort grew and as he became more and more concerned for himself, he imagined the Watching—whatever it was—was pleased, preening at the sight. 

Somehow, he wasn't too behind on his work. He found his desk just as he left it, bar a small, neatly stacked pile of statements, around five in total. Normally, he would have dived straight into them, too curious for his own good, but today there was something keeping him from digging out a tape recorder and spending all morning reading out the complexities of a stranger's horror story. 

He wondered, only half-bitter, if he would one day encounter himself in a statement?

He wanted to believe he wouldn't do to anyone else what he'd done to Lawrence Peralta. He wanted to believe in his own self-control. He didn't, though. He couldn't. No matter how he reassured himself, there was something, some awful acknowledgment of his growing, horrific nature, that ate at him; some awful part of himself that _Knew_ he wasn't trustworthy. 

He rubbed at his temples. Already, he could feel a headache building behind his eyes. He drummed his fingers on his desk, eyeing the pile of statements. He felt—disinterested. He could tell they weren't what he was meant to read. Unbidden, Michael's advice drifted to the forefront of his mind: _The Archivist before you read what came to her. The ones that felt right. You know Archivist. You know these don't hold the answers you want._

The pain in his head grew. His ears rang. He felt exhausted. His break, while illuminating in many aspects, had left him drained in ways he never would have imagined. He itched for something he couldn't verbalize—for something he could hardly understand. His head pounded. Spots clustered at the edges of his vision. The humming returned. 

Jon groaned, dropping his head into his hands. His ears rang. His elbows slipped off of his desk and his desk slipped into nothing and he was just—there—breathing—head pounding—ears ringing. The humming filled his office, growing louder and louder, sweet in its own way, sharp as glass, a rolling boil of noise that cottoned his thoughts, and he couldn't think—he couldn't think—he couldn't—

The humming twisted. The humming circled. The humming... _hummed._

Jon wanted to scream or cry or breathe—he couldn't breathe—he couldn't draw in a breath that was deep enough—his lungs—his lungs—where did they go?

The humming was beautiful, gospel, clear as glass, snow tumbling down a mountain, a circuit hissing with electricity. The humming was ugly, pulling at his nausea, pulling at his seams, pulling and pulling and pulling—

Jon pushed his fingers into his temples. He blinked, disoriented. He wasn't at his desk, anymore. He was standing at the far end of his office, his forehead pressed into the wall, his arms hanging limply at his side. His fingertips were ink-smudged. How long had he been standing there? _Why_ was he standing there? He backed away, unease swelling up inside of him, doubled by the continuous feeling of Watching, and—

His memory felt whited out. 

He could only remember a vague, half-forgotten melody, like the one that came through Michael's doors, like the one that Michael himself hummed, but denied Knowing. 

In the end, there wasn't much Jon could do except return to his desk, as if nothing was wrong, as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened. He was becoming quite good at that. Only, when he sat down, he found that at some point, though he couldn't remember when, he'd spread the statements out across his desktop and covered them with a repeating, spiraling design. The drawing was clustered together so tightly and the lines were drawn so thickly that he could no longer make out the words that had once existed beneath the red ink. 

As he stared, in growing horror, at what he'd done but could not remember doing, a tape-recorder turned off, unnoticed. 

In the end, Jon could only sustain his crisis until lunch. At which point, his phone buzzed with a message from Tim _—come 2 breakroom or else >:)—_and he jumped on the distraction. 

He had never spent much time in the break room before. When he'd worked in research he'd actually enjoyed having awkward lunch-time conversations with his co-workers—in fact, he's fairly certain he ended up meeting Tim through his allotted lunch-time social dealings—but after being promoted to Head Archivist, he'd felt it would be... inappropriate to intrude on his assistants free time. His lunches were hardly ever perishable, so he had no need for the dinky refrigerator and Martin always brought tea to him before he could even consider venturing out. 

Now, as he shuffled into the cramped space, fluorescent lights buzzing and twitching above him, he felt very much an interloper. Nevermind the fact that he'd been invited. 

Martin and Sasha were both sitting on mismatched chairs, poking at whatever they'd brought for lunch, while Tim leaned against the fridge on the other side of the space, watching them with a critical eye. Looking at his assistants, left him feeling—estranged, maybe. Something in his chest spasmed painfully. One of them might not have been themselves anymore, and he hadn't noticed.

How long would the charade have gone on? How long would he have knocked elbows with Sasha or taken tea from Martin without knowing? 

A vague rush of nausea fell over him, as he considered all of this. 

Would it be worse to have never known what had happened—to smile at and work with and confide in someone who wasn't themselves anymore, without ever knowing any better? Or was it worse with the Knowing? Was it worse to be standing in the doorway of the break room, bile resting on the back of his tongue, as he stood and had no choice but to smile at people who might not have been people anymore? Was it worse to Know in halves, as he did now, or would it be worse, later on, to Know the full, terrible truth of everything? 

The weight of the Watching fell over him, so suddenly, that he stumbled to the side, his shoulder slamming into the doorframe. He hissed out in pain. He could feel someone breathing down his neck. There would be no one behind him if he turned around, but that didn't stop the feeling. 

"Jon, oh my—are you alright?" Martin had jumped at the sound, looking at him with wide-eyes. He seemed concerned. Was he really, though? Was any of it real? 

His stomach rolled over again, as he straightened up and took a step into the break room. "I'm fine," he snapped, before plastering a smile that felt glaringly fake onto his face. "That is—yes. I'm alright—thank you, Martin. Just...lost my footing for a moment." 

Martin blinked at him, slowly. "Um, alright then, that's...good."

Jon kept smiling. The silence felt heavy around them.

Tim cleared his throat, pointedly. "And what are you doing here, boss? I can't remember the last time you deigned to grace us poor, common-folk in our natural dwelling."

His smile morphed slowly into something more like a grimace. He supposed it was appropriate enough. "Yes, I just wanted to...well. As you are all aware, I've just returned from a—ahh, vacation, of sorts, and it...put several things into perspective for me. I realize I'm not the easiest boss to have, even when I'm not...spiraling, you could say. And I have come to the realization that I—I haven't been treating any of you as you deserve, so I just came to...apologize for my behavior of late." 

"Wow," Tim said, giving a slow, sardonic clap, "That was beautiful. I could really feel the sincerity." 

"What exactly do you mean by _that,"_ Jon started to ask, pivoting on his foot to glare, but Tim interrupted him with only a wink, so he let his indignation simmer away with a small, restrained sigh. 

Martin interrupted the exchange in a somewhat raised voice, smiling brightly. Was he actually pleased? "Apology accepted, Jon. If you ever feel...like _that_ again, you can talk to me—if you want to. Or, anyone here, really. I'm sure we'd all be willing to help."

Sasha nudged Martin with her elbow, laughing lightly. "Yes, thank you, Jon. Consider everything buried with the bridge. Tom'll be so pleased to hear that things are back to normal here."

"Speaking of, when do we get to meet the new beau, Sasha?" Tim asked. 

She waved her hand indecisively, her lips curling up into a small smile. "I think that depends on you." 

Jon couldn't bring himself to throw away the statements that he'd scribbled over. However terrible the sight of them on his desk was, something felt so much worse about tossing them in the garbage. He felt as if he'd invite more...incidents that way, almost like he'd be declaring an insult. An insult to what, he had no idea, but he was far from eager to find out. 

It was surprisingly catching—the way the drawing wove in and out, the lines still distinct, somehow, the color straining his eyes until he had to blink back tears. The design he'd done wasn't anything special. A collection of messy, hastily done scribbles, weaving in and out of one another. It shouldn't have been so catching. He couldn't understand why it was. 

Except—

Except. 

It reminded Jon of something—someone, once. 

The way the lines twisted around reminded him of Michael and its hair, twisting, and of Michael and its hands, twisting, and of Michael and its body, horrifically fluid, always twisting. Michael, just like the drawing, was catching. There was something about it that clung. There was something about it that felt like pressing into a fresh bruise—expectation and reality in flux. 

If the drawing twisted than Michael twined. 

Did that make Jon a trellis? 

Some jittery, fluttery, cotton-tailed feeling settled in his stomach. It was terrible in the way he'd come to expect all good things to be. Though, if this could be counted as _good_ depended on if he was really losing his mind or not.

Maybe he'd ask Michael. Michael who dealt in lies and slippery diversions. Michael who hurt him. Michael who helped him. Michael who hummed. The psychology of monsters was far above his capabilities. Still, he wondered if Michael would hold an explanation for his time-loss and...artistic deviation. He doubted that it would share any knowledge freely, but maybe Jon would be able to glean something from what it refused to say. 

Michael who reveled in falsehoods and insanity...it seemed unlikely that it would slip up. 

Some part of Jon, a part that still smarted over ideas of fairness and equality, prickled in resentment. He felt as if he was always slipping up around Michael. It felt as if he'd already given too much of himself away—and for what? To feel something syrup-sweet and dizzying settle over him? To take comfort in the sting-burn _-hurt_ that Michael seemed to bring out in him? 

His hands were shaking. Something acidic settled over his tongue. He coughed. 

And he didn't stop coughing. 

He felt something come unrooted inside of him. He felt something coarse and tangled scratch against his throat, and, just like that, he couldn't breathe. He coughed; wet, hacking, rib-aching coughs, and he kept coughing because there was nothing else he could do, and he could feel something soft and rancid come up his throat and curl over the back of his tongue, sweet like rot, and he kept coughing. He coughed until, sitting on his desk, soaked in his spit and his blood, was a handful of flowers, roots included—clumps of dirt and all. 

He coughed until he could breathe again, and, even then, he kept coughing, feeling phantom blooms climb up his throat. He coughed until his blood stopped speckling out. He coughed until he had things to worry about other than Michael. 

The flowers were forget-me-not's, his Nan's favorite. Looking at them made him sick. 

Tim sprawled out on Jon's couch, his beer turning lukewarm from where it was balanced between his knees. Jon envied his ease. Usually, he felt out of place even within his own space; even surrounded by his meager, but meaningful, belongings.

When did a place of living become something like a home? He didn't have an answer. He wasn't sure if he'd ever had an answer to that particular question. 

Unbidden, he found himself thinking of Jane Prentiss and her statement. What was it that she had said? He'd been overcome with revulsion at the time of recording, but, now, he thought he might understand. What was it that she had said—sung—waxed on and on about? _Of what we all are, when you strip away the pretense that there is more to a person than a warm, wet habitat for the billion crawling things that need a home—that love us in their way._

The palm of his left hand itched.

The whole idea of it should have horrified him—it _had_ horrified him the first time he'd read it—but there was something about it that seemed...maybe not right, but...true. What was it to be a home? What was it to be loved? It felt like a non sequitur; two separate ideas of being shoved into one. It should have been abhorrent. It _was_ abhorrent. He knew that. On some basic level, he knew that.

He was drawn to it, though. What was it to be loved? Jon could feel something constrict inside him, an ache he couldn't place. It wasn't loneliness. Not exactly. It was—emptiness. An absence. Wasn't that always the case? Jonathan Sims: orphan and unwanted ward. Jonathan Sims: friendless and alone. Jonathan Sims: loveless and unlovable. 

He wasn't entranced by the idea of being a home for the sake of being a home, of course. Jane Prentiss and what she turned herself into was repulsive in every way imaginable to him. And yet, he could understand. Knowing wasn't the same as being loved. Watching did nothing to absolve loneliness. Was he lonely? Jon had never considered himself to be, before. However, as the ache grew stronger, creeping up his throat, forming a lump that was unfortunately familiar _—oh, gumdrop—_ he realized the truth of the matter: he was alone. 

He was alone.

He was _alone._

Jon could no longer ignore the ache. He let it drop over him all at once. He let it poke and prod at all of his sores. He was alone. 

But he didn't have to be. Distantly, he could hear the buzz of a song start up, thick as honey, ready to smother him, gently. It was catchy. The trill of a hundred cicadas. The slow, muffled spread of fungus over a forest floor. It stroked and it fussed and it _wanted_ him. When was the last time anyone had wanted him? It made such sweet promises. What was it to be loved? All he had to do was open his heart and find out. 

It wasn't love as he'd ever conceived of it. It was—stronger, all-encompassing. It was primal. A need as much as a feeling. It was the promise of consumption. It was the promise of comfort. 

All he had to do was open his heart. The song reached a fever pitch. All he had to do was open his heart. And he—

Blinked, leaning as far away from Tim, who had placed the back of his hand on his forehead, as he could without falling off the couch entirely. He could still hear the song, crooning softly in his ears, but it was fading now, leaving him as dreams left—with only wisps of sensations clouding his head. The palm of his left hand itched. He ignored it. 

Instead, he devoted all of his energy to glowering at Tim. "What are you doing?"

"Just checking, boss. You were pretty zoned out there," he held up his hands in mock reticence, though Jon could see a hint of genuine worry still lingering about his face. "Is everything alright?"

"I..." He couldn't remember much of what he'd been thinking about. All he was left with was the vague and confusing recollection of trees rotting in the woods. "Yes. Sorry, I suppose being back at work wore me out more than I thought it would." 

"It really takes it out of you, doesn't it?" Tim commiserated, taking a sip of his beer. "The first time I went in after coming to terms with everything I could barely make myself meet anyone's eyes, let alone talk to them."

He frowned, his head throbbing. "I just wish there was a way we could easily figure out who the NotThem is. There has to be analog evidence somewhere. People don't just...vanish without a trace."

Tim laughed without humor, slumping back. "I think you'll find people vanish without a trace all the time. What's happening in the Archives isn't anything new."

Jon sighed. Pessimism, he thought privately, would not get them anywhere. "Yes, I know that, but vanishing isn't the same as—as whatever's happening in the Archives, now. Maybe...maybe we can get ahold of one of the photographers from the fundraiser last year. They might still have undeveloped film or...copies or something—I don't know. It's a longshot, but—"

He was interrupted by Tim, who sat up so quickly that his beer fell to the floor. Jon eyed the growing puddle on his carpet in exhausted disdain, but Tim didn't seem to notice. "It appears on tape and instantly developed film."

"As far as we know," Jon agreed, cautiously. 

"I know how we can figure out who it is," Tim said, speaking so fast and with so much excitement that he seemed to hardly breathe. "Our employee photos. Not the ones from research, but the ones we had to take when our badges were replaced after you became head archivist. Do you remember? Elias said that after Gertrude's death the system needed a reboot, so we all had to get new identification—"

"And that included new employee photos," he finished for him, far from sold on the idea. "But those were all digital. We wouldn't be able to notice if anyone was replaced or not." 

Tim blinked at him, "What? No, don't you remember? We took a digital one to get our badge printed, but afterward, the photographer also took a polaroid—said it had to do with Institute tradition— that Elias wanted them, you know, something along those lines. I remember thinking it was weird, but I just shrugged it off. It's the Magnus Institute, everything's weird."

Jon felt something uneasy prickle at the back of his mind. "I didn't have a polaroid taken."

"Are you sure?"

Jon wasn't really sure of anything anymore, but he figured that was far from prudent to say. "Yes, I'm sure. I think I would remember something as strange as that. You said Elias wanted them? Do you know why?"

"Who knows why Elias does anything that he does? I try not to think about it."

"Alright," Jon said, slowly, his mind whirring in a hundred different directions. "Do you know if the others also had polaroids taken of them?"

"Well, it would be strange if Elias only wanted a polaroid of me, wouldn't it?" Tim said, mildly snippy, obviously not impressed with how Jon was taking his brilliant revelation. "I vaguely remember talking to Sasha about it. We didn't really say much at the time, because it seemed so small compared to everything else that ended up happening—I can't believe I forgot until now. _God—_ employee photos. That's all we need." 

Jon nodded. "How are we supposed to get them? If Elias wanted them, that means—"

"We're going to need to get into his office and find them," Tim said, looking far too excited at the prospect. 

He barely stopped himself from rolling his eyes. "And how do you propose we manage that?" 

Tim laughed. "Breaking into offices is easy once you have enough experience—and I have plenty from working with you. This will be a breeze. Trust me."

And, against his better judgment, Jon found that he did. He also trusted that whatever plan Tim came up with to get those photos would be ultimately destructive and dangerous. His headache flared in warning. 

He was walking. He'd been walking for a long time, he knew, though he couldn't remember when he started walking or how long he'd been walking or why he was walking. He just...walked. There was comfort in routine, of course, but this wasn't routine for him, was it? Did he normally walk? He imagined if he did it wasn't like it was now.

He was walking, but his steps didn't fall properly. He could hear the press of his soles on the carpeted floor as if he was wearing heels on marble. The sound always came a beat too late. He'd take a step and then be in the motion of another without ever landing the first. He'd take a step forward and be ten feet behind where he started. Sometimes, he'd be on carpet, or sometimes on linoleum or cobblestone or nothing at all. They rotated without rhyme or reason. 

He was walking on marble and there was no sound at all no matter how hard he stepped. The walls were leaning at an angle, slightly slanted. If he stopped walking he imagined he would have liked to study the pictures that littered the walls like freckles on a face, but, as it was, he didn't stop. He just kept walking.

The walls were all fuschia. The floors were all fuschia. No matter where he was everything was just fuschia. 

He hated fuschia, he found. 

The hallway he walked down twisted, sometimes; curved, others. Sometimes the walls screamed—not with vocal cords or mouths or anything like that, that would be impossible after all, but they screamed and continued to scream until he could feel a warmth spread through his head and then down his neck as his ears bled—the blood, he assumed, was fuschia, as well.

Sometimes the floor moved upwards like a ramp until he was hunched under the ceiling he never noticed and forced to crawl and contort himself until the passage cleared; sometimes someone would show up just at the edge of his peripherals and the walls would disappear, but whenever he turned to go to them, he'd just find a picture frame holding something he couldn't see, the wall closer to him than he'd noticed previously. 

All the while everything was fuschia. 

He kept walking because there was nothing else to do. He kept walking because he was meant to be walking. He kept walking for days—months—years. He couldn't be sure. There was no such thing as surety in a place like this. He accepted that. Would he have accepted that if he was more himself? Though, that raised questions of self that he was too busy walking to consider. 

Eventually, the hallway curved wider and wider, until it was no longer a hallway but a corridor, and then it continued to curve wider, moving in a strange circular pattern until he wasn't in a corridor either, but a room that seemed to bow and twist before his eyes. The room was empty except for a soft, static-filled chaise lounge in the center where a thing that was both familiar and foreign to him sat, its long hair curling on the floor. Its hair was golden. The rest was fuschia. 

The thing laughed. It was a cloying and clinging sound. It rattled his head. "You shouldn't be here."

"What?" His teeth chattered when he spoke. 

"I see through you, Lawrence-who-isn't-Lawrence. Foolish to even try." The thing had very sharp teeth and very pointed fingers and was looking at him—apparently Lawrence-who-wasn't-Lawrence—with an appraising hunger. 

"I don't understand." This echoed out until all he could hear was his own confusion rippling towards him. 

The thing laughed once again. "I know. Isn't it delightful?" 

His head hurt. Everything was fuschia. At least, until the color began to bleed away, stripping the room of any tangibility, disappearing and taking everything, even him, with it. Everything was fuschia, until it wasn't, and—

"Are you alright, Archivist?" Michael asked, not sounding particularly concerned one way or another. It sat in its usual spot in the armchair across from the couch. Its legs were curled beneath it, normal at first glance, but looking at them for any prolonged period would reveal that they were too thin and too lumpy to be regular human legs. 

Was he alright?

Jon could not remember sitting down on the couch. He could not remember Michael's arrival. He could not remember much of anything after Tim left—time slipping away from him in sharp, static bursts that set his nerve-endings off. 

"I'm fine," Jon said, far from fine, but not willing to concede to any weakness in front of Michael. "Is there a reason you're visiting?" 

Michael tilted its head to the side. Its hair should have tumbled over, but did not. "Do I need a reason to visit? Is it not enough to simply _do."_

Normally, Jon would have had the patience to endure whatever games it wanted to play, but tonight, rattled as he was, he could not imagine anything worse. "Michael, I've had a very long day, so if you need something, please—"

"Need," it repeated, teeth suddenly pointed in its mouth. "What a silly concept. To exist on needs alone...oh, Archivist, you're still so tangled up that your needs are wants and your wants are needs."

His hands were shaking. Not in fear, like he would have expected, but in tired, resigned anger. "Why are you here, Michael?" 

There was a long silence. 

"To see you," it said, reluctantly, before breaking out into giggles. "I want to be _friends,_ Archivist. I've been on my best behavior, but you've been awfully rude. And isn't this what friends do? Visit one another." 

"Usually there's some warning," Jon answered, slouching back. 

Michael tapped a long, sharp finger against its lips. It was cutting itself with each tap. Something that wasn't blood beaded out. "You're too caught in routine." 

"I haven't had a routine until today." 

"There's the problem then, Archivist. Maybe you've outgrown your den." Michael made a contemplative sound, its wide, yellow eyes gleaming unpleasantly. "That is...your keeper hasn't done a very good job of watching you lately. Does he care?"

He sighed. "I've already told you: I don't have a keeper."

"Would you like one, Archivist?" It asked, staring at him intently.

"I—" Jon swallowed. He had a sinking suspicion that the two of them had been having completely different conversations. "I don't know what you're asking me."

It tittered, making Jon's teeth ache. "You don't Know? Don't you want to? Doesn't it call to you?"

"Michael—"

"I can feel what you want, Archivist," Michael said, a terrible smile spreading over its face. "You pretend that you don't want what it is that you do. Why? Don't you want to Know?" 

Again, Jon attempted to interject. _"Michael—"_

Again, he was interrupted. "Can you hear it still? The humming? Don't you want to know what it is?" 

He froze.

There was a door, a brittle red in color with a fogged square window, on the wall beside Michael's chair. It hadn't been there when Michael sat down or for most of their conversation, but it was there now, and he hadn't even noticed its appearance. The door, like all of Michael's doors, was humming the same, horrible, dragging sound. As he listened, his vision went fuzzy, rippling as if he was looking through a funhouse mirror. 

"You said you didn't know what the humming was," Jon said, feeling unmoored. His nose might have been bleeding. He wasn't sure. He couldn't process anything. Making any sort of coherent sense felt near impossible with the sound wrapping around his head, muffling all of his thoughts until it was difficult to even think straight.

"Archivist," Michael said, sounding nauseatingly fond, as it reached one impossibly long hand out to him as if it expected Jon to take it. "I lied."

The humming grew louder. Jon was standing now, though he couldn't remember making the choice to. "What do you want?"

"Want," it repeated, standing too, tapping its foot on the ground. "What a strange notion. I'm only trying to extend an invitation to you, Archivist. Wouldn't you like to See what's behind the door?" 

Jon took a step back, his head screaming at him to move closer, the humming calling to him with every passing moment. "A door is not an answer. You told me that." 

"A door is a possibility," Michael said, "What are answers compared to that?"

"I don't need possibilities," Jon said, managing to get behind the couch, holding onto it with all the strength he had left. "I need the truth and if there's one thing I already know its that you're the antithesis to that endeavor. Leave."

Michael looked startled. "Archivist, you don't—"

 _"Leave,"_ he repeated, the order booming out from him. 

Michael left.

The door and the humming vanished with him, leaving Jon to collapse to the ground, his heart pounding in his chest. Before he had even begun to process what had just happened—though he wasn't entirely sure he wanted to unpack any of it—he was already choking on a flower bud, gagging as half a dozen or so peonies fell into his lap. 

It was then that Jon came to the unfortunate realization that he always seemed to have one of his fits when dealing with Michael or Michael-related thoughts.

He gagged again, though this time it had nothing to do with any flower. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> chapter summary: the Beholding and the Corruption and the Spiral brawl over Jon. 
> 
> i am so sorry it took so long to get this out! i'm currently working on my senior thesis and a full course load, so i honestly feel like whenever i'm not doing schoolwork i'm trying to catch up on sleep, which has really hindered my writing schedule. i won't make any promise for the next update time, but i do promise i AM actively still working on this story whenever i can. my time is just very constrained atm. 
> 
> if you enjoyed, please leave a review!


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